A lot of what follows I collected while I watched the results come in on the Twitter (don’t blow it, @jack). I’ve gone deeper when I had the time, but there’s a lot more real work to be done. I haven’t had time to take a serious look at the exit polls — CNN; the Times — so I’m hesistant to assign causes or draw conclusions. (In particular, I don’t know much about the mechanics of the Sanders campaign; could be brilliance by Devine and his crew, could be unknown locals pulled Devine’s chestnuts out of the fire; could be both were brilliant, or anything in between. Ditto the Clinton operation.) For the same reason, this post isn’t as full of linky goodness as it ought to be.)

One of many headlines: “Clinton, Trump Poised to Sail Through Michigan.” In addition, Twitter provides many vivid descriptions of media dysfunction, including cutting away from the tight Democratic race to cover a Trump speech, analysts framing everything as good for Clinton, the faces of panicked stenographers as the narrative fell apart, and CNN announcers relentlessly clicking on their fancy interactive map to find that one precinct pop-up where the missing Clinton votes could possibly be.

Oh, and the political class blowing it extends very much to the Clinton campaign apparatus:

Jeff Zeleny says a Clinton aide told him she &quot;misunderstood the electorate&quot; in Michigan. Oh that&#39;s all

Seems a little late in the day for misunderstanding the electorate. Maybe Clinton should reintroduce herself to them? Have a conversation? Maybe a listening tour?

4. This race will go all the way to the convention.

Sanders will have another fundraising surge from small donors. Fortune:

He will likely be able to use this win to get another round of fundraising, as most of his donors are individuals who haven’t maxed out their donation totals; if they gave $10 in October, he can ask them to give another $10 now. And given the general enthusiasm of Sanders voters, it’s a good bet a lot of them will.

Sanders gets a million bucks when Clinton lies about him. So what happens when he wins?

And given that Clinton as much as called for Sanders to drop out on Monday, losing to Sanders on Tuesday isn’t a good look. What she said:

[CLINTON] The sooner I could become your nominee, the more I could begin to turn my attention to the Republicans.

If only that pesky old guy with the hair stopped hanging around, I could put this thing away! (Notice that careful parsing of that wording could include a scenario where Clinton appeals to moderate Republicans, and throws Sanders, as well as her early voters), under the bus.)

And Sanders leveraged the difference. (Remember all the pearl-clutching when Sanders said he’d do better with Black voters in the North? Turns out he was right.) From The Nation:

Yet Sanders’ success in Michigan was helped by the fact he significantly improved his performance with African American voters. While Sanders had struggled in the south to get above 15% of the vote with black people, exit polls in Michigan showed the Vermont senator winning 30% of the African American vote. In an electorate that was a quarter African American, the improvement in Sanders’ margin was enough to make the race unexpectedly competitive for him.

(See also below, on the “Obama Coalition.”)

6. Clinton paid for Iraq and Libya in Dearborn.

Dearborn has a lot of Muslim voters.

Bernie did a rally in Dearborn and did Arabic-langauge advertising. Team Intersectional Hillary did neither

Clinton’s blown a lot of faraway brown people to pink mist in pursuit of her “pragmatic” “hard choices” in foreign policy. So it’s unsurprising that the relatives of those people now living in this country would take that into account when making their voting decision.

7. Did Clinton’s auto bailout smear help her or hurt her?

Let’s start with a candidate for euphemism of the year:

David Axelrod speaking the truth on CNN: &quot;Clinton struck a false note on the auto bailout.&quot;

It is true that Bush’s failure to fund an auto-specific bailout meant that TARP funds got used to fund the $85 billion auto rescue (Bush had already spent some money on the auto companies — basically just enough to ensure they’d go under on Obama’s watch, but not enough to do anything to save them). But that’s not what the vote was (and there might have been enough money for the auto bailout in any case).

… Contemporary reporting on the vote also did not mention the auto bailout (though there had been discussion that it might be used the previous month).

Moreover, there had been an auto bailout vote in the Senate (on a bill already passed by the House) on December 11, which failed. Both Bernie and Hillary voted in support.

So while Hillary’s attack was technically correct — Bernie did vote against giving Jamie Dimon more free money, which had the side effect of voting against the second installment on the fund that would eventually become the auto bailout — he did not vote against the auto bailout.

The auto bailout attack was a pretty shameful ploy, one that otherwise would make it fair game to really hit on Hillary’s own actions in a way Bernie has not yet done.

Well, maybe that can start now? (Incidentally, kudos to Sanders for not snarling, Bob Dole-style, “Quit lying about my record.” That’s a job for surrogates.)

8. Did Clinton’s Flint gambit fail because of her trust deficit?

Basically, voters just don’t like or trust Clinton. We can argue about whether that’s fair, but realpolitik says it’s true.

Clinton made the Flint lead situation a centerpiece of her Michigan campaign. But Flint split evenly Sanders/Clinton. Could one reason be that no matter what she says, she’s not trusted? “Words are wind,” as they say on Game of Thrones.

After finally stepping out of the shadows earlier this month to begin stumping for his wife, Bill Clinton is reportedly seizing a larger role in advising Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign as he grows increasingly worried that she isn’t focusing enough on the dozens of primary states that vote in March.

News of Bill’s involvement in Clinton’s camp reflects a very real concern: what once seemed an easy path to victory for the former secretary of state has now turned treacherous… According to Politico, Bill has been urging the campaign to begin diverting resources outside Iowa and New Hampshire, reportedly calling her campaign manager, Robert Mook, “almost daily” to persuade him to send more staff to the states voting in March.

Bill Clinton: “Bring me the head of Robbie Mook!”

10. Clinton has made Sanders a better candidate.

Ha ha. Just snark.

11. Clinton is only electable in primary states she can’t win in the general.

Actually, Brownstein is wrong: The demographic (granted, the only demographic) that Sanders won in South Carolina was younger blacks.) And:

Although Clinton won the black vote in Michigan, her margin was considerably smaller than it had been in the South. Sanders ran even with her among the youngest black voters, opening a generational gap similar to those that had been seen in other states among Latino and white voters.

Outside a Hillary Clinton rally at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit on Monday night, hip-hop producer Jerry Flynn Dale was on the verge of exasperation as he tried to talk a trio of college students out of voting for Sanders..

“Look up in the sky,” he demanded in response to their argument that college should be fully paid for by government. “Is that the pie you are going to eat?”

Civilized countries like Germany make and serve that pie, as anybody with access to Google (or a passport) knows. Are we so “exceptional” that we can’t?

13. The “white working class” vote is not monolithic.

I just want to lay down a marker bring Case-Deaton into this. Any time you have that level of organic damage to a population, you get a political reaction. BlackLivesMatter; Act-Up. Our political class wants to frame “white working class” votes as driven by racism or possibly nostalgia for the 50s (a particularly idiotic example). I think the picture is larger.

14. Why not a one-on-one Trump vs. Sanders debate right now?

Mano a mano! Too soon?

Conclusion

The Clinton campaign will double down on what they’re already doing. We’re going to see a spot of trouble, now.

About Lambert Strether

Readers, I have had a correspondent characterize my views as realistic cynical. Let me briefly explain them. I believe in universal programs that provide concrete material benefits, especially to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime example, but tuition-free college and a Post Office Bank also fall under this heading. So do a Jobs Guarantee and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can deliver on such programs, because the two are different flavors of neoliberalism (“Because markets”). I don’t much care about the “ism” that delivers the benefits, although whichever one does have to put common humanity first, as opposed to markets. Could be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t much care, as long as the benefits are delivered.
To me, the key issue — and this is why Medicare for All is always first with me — is the tens of thousands of excess “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton study, and other recent studies. That enormous body count makes Medicare for All, at the very least, a moral and strategic imperative. And that level of suffering and organic damage makes the concerns of identity politics — even the worthy fight to help the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — bright shiny objects by comparison. Hence my frustration with the news flow — currently in my view the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the other by out-of-power liberals and their allies in the State and in the press — a news flow that constantly forces me to focus on matters that I regard as of secondary importance to the excess deaths. What kind of political economy is it that halts or even reverses the increases in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I am also very hopeful that the continuing destruction of both party establishments will open the space for voices supporting programs similar to those I have listed; let’s call such voices “the left.” Volatility creates opportunity, especially if the Democrat establishment, which puts markets first and opposes all such programs, isn’t allowed to get back into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I love the tactical level, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been blogging about it daily for fourteen years, but everything I write has this perspective at the back of it.

I wonder if she was just playing ‘prevent defense,’ trying to run out the clock (and failed, like it usually does when a team plays prevent defense – though she seemed to have picked a bigger number of delegates yesterday due to her landslide victory in Louisiana).

I wouldn’t get your hopes up that TPP just died. Never underestimate the ability of the Democratic Party to do the absolute wrong thing, unless they are forced to do otherwise. If Clinton is elected, does anyone think that she will still oppose the TPP? If she comes out in favor of it as President, it could very well be enacted. The institutional Democratic Party, if she is president, will be in the position of having to defend her against every attack that will be coming her way. There’s no way that they would undercut her on something like this.

I agree that we can’t count on the Democrats to stop TPP. Just one note: it seems that these trade deals are as unpopular with rank-and-file Republicans as with rank-and-file Democrats. While the Democrats hate their base, the Republicans fear their base.

There will still be some vulnerability from that faction depending on ‘retirees’, probable future retirees, and those who will not be returning to office on the Republican front. On the Democratic front hell they just flat out slap the people who vote for them and tell them to like it.

Catching a bit of MSNBC’s coverage last night, something that Lawrence O’Donnell said was striking. He pointed out that, regardless of what President’s said about trade deals while campaigning, they always supported them while in office. He then said that Sanders would offer a sharp break from that pattern.

I watched msnbc last nite until Bernie finally won – I thot Clinton was stuffing ballot boxes just to keep close to Bernie so she could steal it by just a few votes in the end. Lucky thing she did not. About TPP: in her Flint speech and others, Clinton is trying to twist the anger away from TPP & trade and onto the corporations that take tax subsidies and then offshore everything – she’ll claw that money back etc. Of course she doesn’t tie up loose ends by pointing out that offshoring enables such good export profits from the US that her little tax claw backs would be a drop in the bucket. Bernie doesn’t pretend to argue a non-point, he just goes for TPP’s throat and you can see she’s lying. So I was impressed by msnbc too when one of them said that there is a trust gap and thought it was because “Hillary is always the second one” to mention TPP & trade but she never is the first to bring it up. Excellent perception for a neoliberal talking head…

I think it was Chuck Todd who pointed that out. What he did not point out is that she can do more to lay the issue to rest for the campaign simply by beginning to pressure Democrats in Congress to announce their opposition to the TPP right now before their re-election campaigns.

If she were to do that, then she could get a majority of the Democrats, all of whom now support her (probably even including DWS), who voted for fast-track to change sides and vow to vote against TPP and any other trade agreements with ISDS clauses or equivalents in them.

But Clinton has already said that even though she opposes TPP she will not work for its defeat. So, that is a strong piece of evidence that her conversion to TPP opposition is insincere.

Bill’s speech riches and CGI, isn’t this a perfect acronym, only came when Hillary became a threat to be President after Kerry lost. Those were investments not payoffs. Michelle is an ordinary first lady. She isn’t go run state wide in Illinois.

Obama will be dropped as soon as the nominee is final. He probably won’t be able to swing good tee times.

Some D officeholders voted for Fast Track. Others voted against it. Of those that voted for it, how many are up for re-election in Nov. 2016? What if Sandernista voters were to vote for their Republican opponents in 2016? What if such Sandernista vengeance-voters actually made the difference which could get the pro Fast Track Ds removed from office? Such disinfection and chemotherapy against pro Free Trade Democrats all over the country could begin disinfecting and decontaminating the Democratic Party and purifying it down to a pro-America anti-TreasonTrade Party to be used as a fighting force against Free Tradism. It could be the start of a genuine reconquest of the D Party and a genuinely effective Stalinist-type purge of all its Clintonite and Obamacrat and Third Way and DLC elements.

People will whine that this would leave the Democrats with a “minority” in Congress. Well . . . Newt Gingrich showed what a determined minority can do. A “Red Gingrich” Party could prevent the House and Senate from doing anything at all whatsoever until that “Red Gingrich” Party could conquer a “Red Gingrich” majority in the House and the Senate. They could then use Gingrich methods against America’s domestic enemies in the House and the Senate and proceed to destroy their agenda, their hopes and their dreams just as the R + 6 is destroying the hopes and dreams of the Global Axis of Jihad in Syria. At least a Red Gingrich Party would be pro-American enough to at least think in such terms.

In some cases you should punish them, but I’m not sure we wouldn’t the ones being punished. One of my senators is part of the cancer that infects the whole system. He worked behind the scenes negotiating small changes in the Fast Track legislation in order to get enough Democratic votes for it, but voted against it himself. Yes, Schumer is up this year, but no one is primarying him.

His only announced opponent is the sacrificial lamb Wendy Long who lost by the largest margin in history to Gillibrand in 2012. She is a lawyer who worked for Romney, supported Roberts and Alito and has worked for ‘judicial reform’. IOW, someone who would vote for the TPP and torture in a hot minute.

And I’m pretty damn sure that Schumer will be an even more effective evil outside of Congress as well.

There are a lot of very powerful interests who will push the TPP to the death, but their power is waning.

The GOP looks like it is imploding to the point where it will be every man/woman for themselves this fall. That doesn’t bode well for any attempts by Ryan to strong arm refuseniks or hold onto reluctant ‘yes’ votes. Also a Trump ticket means that the platform will have to bend to his will on trade, not the other way around. I see no path forward for the TPP until the lame duck, at the minimum. Notice that Obama has not made a peep about it lately. Every day that goes by, his power wanes.

I agree that if she wins, Hillary will flip flop. It’s in her DNA. She will do what she has to in order to win, which is the greater goal. But that also means throwing Obama under the bus if it furthers her goal.

Clinton is a Free Trade Traitor in her heart. If she becomes President, she will serve and advance the International Free Trade Conspiracy every which way she can think of. Also, she would like to receive hundreds of millions of dollars after leaving office from the Free Trade interests as a reward for getting TTP/TTIP/ etc. passed.

Thank God somebody remembers the secrets the government doesn’t want you to know! And it’s more unspeakable than just that!! Hitler’s brain is cared for in the secret underground Pentagon bunker, 52 stories underground where whenever the Pope visits the USA, the brain is transferred from Pope to Pope to keep it alive for a 1,000 years!!! At least that’s the goal, that I heard about, from a guy who worked for the Joint Chiefs and swears to Christ it’s the truth!!!

If we wanted to be ‘vicious’ about it, we could get those former members of the “Sachs Pistols,” Ron and Nancy to do the new theme song for Hillary at the national convention; said song being “God Save the Queen.”

Not saying you are wrong, but any changes would have to be negotiated and agreed upon by the countries involved before the treaty is presented for a vote in Congress. Congress itself cannot change it all. At least not according to Fast Track rules. If they want to change it, they have to go back to the regular Congressional procedure, including amendments, discussion on the floor and meeting the filibuster level in the Senate. So those cosmetic changes are also a challenge.

Last night was actually when the Democrat party died–they just don’t know it yet. The Repub party is already dead, courtesy of Trump. According to sources I read last night, Bernie pulled in 70% of independents and over 50% of the black youth vote. I’m sure he also walloped Clinton again with the votes of all younger citizens.

Bernie keeps pulling in the independents, just like Trump. People are voting for the individual this time, not for the party. That’s one reason the polling is so off–it’s typically heavy on registered party voters. I’ve said before that thousands of people left the party after 2008. Only the black vote helped Obama in 2016, because a lot of former Dems either sat out the race or voted third party.

The political establishment, and, consequently, the Wall Street establishment, is on the ropes. Voters are finally sick of auctions versus elections. The Trump vote is an anti-party, anti-establishment vote. The Bernie vote is powered by people who feel they finally have someone to vote for without holding their collective nose.

From your keyboard to the ears of the goddess (Minerva, the discerning, clever one). Let’s see how this plays out in Illinois, where we have a thoroughly decrepit Democratic Party attempting to hold down dissent in the city of Chicago and even (miracle of miracles) the Chicago City Council. And yet the Republican Party of Illinois is also a rump party of knuckleheads like Rauner and wet noodles like Moderate Mark Kirk.

I think it’s also the night the MSM began its own slow march towards irrelevance and death, and they did it to themselves. There’s barely an ounce of credibility left. The really good news is that publishing has been radically democratized by the Internet and its fantastically accessible communications technologies (I was going to say “protocols”, but then I’d be giving away my IT roots). The fact is the MSM could be replaced by completely independent media without too much effort. All that’s needed are people with a talent for organization — and the courage of their convictions.

I would say though that one thing I’ve noticed with the msm the past couple of days is that they are finally attributing the success of Sanders and Trump to the voters’ ire at the trade deals. That’s at least some stab at accuracy.

Also, recently at least, msnbc has begun on occasion to list the dem delegates as pledged and unpledged. Not always, but enough to make me wonder if their own blatant bias was beginning to have some blowback.

MSNBC’s ratings are way down compared to this time in previous cycles. It’s a dumpster fire.

The key to their relevance as more than a glorified echo chamber for GE was Olbermann dropping pretense and going for the jugular after Katrina.

Given the youth split in the Democratic race and establishment position of CNN for breaking news on airplane disasters, the network is in real trouble. I don’t think they can rebound after branding themselves as a liberal alternative and going all in for Hillary, Obama, and Trump instead of more center left truth telling.

Compared to msnbc at least, I thought CNN’s coverage of the last Clinton-Sanders debate was far more balanced than anything msnbc has churned out recently. Maybe like 70-30 balanced as opposed to 90-10 balance.

If the Establishment is able to shut down the internet either in stages or all at once, one hopes seekers of dissident information are prepared to buy and pay for newspapers and newsletters which offer the same kind of dissident information which internet players currently offer.

A lot of little newspapers were started during the President Jackson period to advance the Jackson agenda. Those newspapers remained alive for a long time after. If people are prepared to pay-for-a-paper, perhaps a whole new flock of dissident newspapers could emerge if the internet is kill-switched and go-darked.

The internet won’t be kill-switched. That would lead to an economic crash and likely violent unrest. What you’ll see instead will be the Star-Spangled version of China’s Great Firewall. And even then their are cracks.

There are also alternatives to the WorldWideWeb, and even “the internet”. They’re all very niche or historical now, but if you give the public no other choice, they will come back and grow rapidly.

Sorry, but the companies themselves are working their way towards a neo-liberal version of The Great Firewall. Remember who did a lot of the heavy lifting for the Peoples Republic on the Great Firewall of China project? Hint: It starts with “M.”

It’s pretty obvious that the younger generation/Millenials vote for Bernie: they have much fewer opportunities than their parents and Hillary doesn’t show any promise on the economic front given her donors, previous statements, Bill’s legacy, etc.

It’s also pretty obvious why Bernie won Michigan: the manufacturing sector KNOWS that it was the trade deals that ultimately lost them their job, not lack of bailout money. GM is a prime example: bailed out by the government, only to offshore HUGE sectors of the company to China, use more Chinese suppliers, etc. People in America may be swayed easily, but they are not THAT stupid; to live through the complete annihilation American manufacturing while the Clinton and Bush administrations all “promised” “more jobs” and “hope” only to let every large manufacturing company to offshore 80% of their jobs with 0 penalty.

The polls are only estimates. You gotta figure that there are certain people who will never ever cooperate with any poll or survey of any kind. I’m one of these people. I just don’t believe in polls. If they would give me some money to answer, maybe I would, but they never offer any money. I hope Bernie beats HRC in some of the states next week. Of course, NAFTA, GATT, TPP, etc. have been against the public’s will from the beginning. Being opposed to these policies was the only reason for Ross Perot’s success and Pat Buchanan’s success. Any candidate can capitalize on these issues, but then they might have FUND RAISING PROBLEMS. In other words, they’re on the take, they’re taking bribes, corporations buy them off.

I’m by no means a polling expert, but I’ve read the polling technology relies on land-lines and now many people don’t have land lines. I’m thinking more people nowadays won’t cooperate with them also (see my post above). Why answer any questions? What’s in it for me? Or they just intentionally lie to throw them off track. Polling is an industry which really should not even exist. Let the people vote.

Alexander Burns’ round up article in the NYTimes front page is equally hilarious for the almost childlike refusal to acknowledge what happened. I read it and it reminded me of a 6 year old with chocolate smears on her face insisting she didn’t steal the cookies, it was really her brother.

Reading through, I think the Hilary ‘meme’ will be that she lost thousands of votes from Dems registering as Reps to vote for Kasich. Maybe some did, but the major swing in black votes to Sanders shows that the movement was and is genuine – people changed votes, it wasn’t a simple case of Hilary not getting her vote out.

Ta very much for the link, I’d missed that in my morning trawl through the Guardian (I tend to do that while flossing my teeth, both activities are similarly enjoyable and, these days, I find I can’t stand more than a few articles even though I know there’s sometimes some good stuff in there) and it always tickles me when thousands of their — as a rule quite able — commentariat pile in and whack the really dreadful pieces like that.

I rushed — erm, perhaps trudged — down and watched Sky News (for the benefit of US readers, Sky is Fox’s European mini-me outlet, much the same, maybe a little worse) do their coverage of the primaries. I could not believe it ! Sky was going on in the same manner as if the Queen had been carjacked from her carriage going down The Mall en route to a coronation by a tramp who nicked her purse and pee’d on one of the corgis. “What?”, said Sky (sort-of) “Hillary?” “That Hillary ? Our Hillary?” “Interrupted in the middle of her procession?” “By who?” “”Bernie” Sanders?” “Who the heck is Bernie Sanders?” “Wasn’t he the one with the side-kick dog called Schnorbitz?”

… it was about that level. Goodness knows what they’d do if there’s any more trouble from those pesky voters.

“We” like Hillery long time here in Europe – just pick almost any paper, it’s all for Hillary … and more wars, more aggression on Russia, more secret treaties, more scummy deals with Turkey. “News Media” are a joke.

It almost reminds you of Karl Rove’s meltdown when Romney lost…. remember that one? Took him a full 5 minutes on live TV because his ideology and belief set was so strong… and then when the reality hit, he completely folded because he had nothing to fall back on. His reality system didn’t sustain him.

It might not just have been ideology that got whacked that night for Rove. He had that meltdown over Ohio, one of the more questionable of our particular states when it comes to counting the votes. And after the election, Anonymous claims to have hacked their system to remove the ‘improvements’. Funnily enough Rove’s meltdown is one of the reasons I believe them.

yes, me too. and I’m distrustful of any “delay” in precinct reporting… I always suspect that a heist was foiled and people are scrambling to cover it up. Last nite I thought Clinton was shaving votes around Detroit – that delay was tense.

Check out the NYT comments on the Healy/Martin article now running on the front page, and especially note the difference between the Reader’s Picks and the NYT Picks. The comments are almost uniformly roundly critical of the Times obvious bias to HRC, but somehow they managed to fish out 10 comments for NYT Picks that don’t complain about the horrible coverage but rather parrot back the talking points the Grey Lady repeats like a mantra: Trump Bad, HRC electable, [Sanders non-existent]. Quite illuminating.

Also last night I was following the NYT live blog on the election and after both races had been called I did a ctrl-f on the candidates’ names: Trump 27, Clinton 24, Sanders 11.

Did almost want to respond to one woman over there talking about how this could happen when Clinton had done so much for women and children there and throughout the world. I wanted to point out that the women and children of Honduras and Libya might have a distinctly different opinion of the value of Clinton’s ‘help’, and ask her about all the women who watched their sons sent to prison in America and their children go hungry because of the Clintons’ crime and welfare reform policies. But then I’m still encountering idiots who look at Clinton’s senate record and think she was proactive rather than a johnny come lately signature of support on bills that other championed through the hard processes.
So sad that our fourth estate is so useless anymore that you have to actually do your own research to find out her resume is long but less than a millimeter deep.

Usually after screaming how unfair it is that people will insist on bringing up that Goldwater business (she was only a child!), they proceed to base their “support of women and children” myth on her activity with the Children’s Defense Fund early in her career. They can do this because Marian Wright Edelman keeps swinging back and forth, first praising her to the skies back then for her help then being out of sorts over her support for “welfare reform.” Apparently, the tiff is over, since they gave her an award in ’13.

As near as I’ve managed to find, that’s the main pillar of her claims to be strong on the defense of women and children. Yes, she’s come down on the side of the angels when it comes to feminist issues, but her brand of feminism has always struck me as the one I found useless back when the current movement started in the ’70s. It’s all about white, middle-class women’s concerns, with the occasional bone tossed to the people on the other side of the community gate.

Ironically, one of her strongest claims to advancing women’s interests was her time on the board of Walmart, where she apparently did push the company to bring more women into management. But of course she never talks about this because her lack of effort (or complicity) in supporting the co.s’ anti-unionism and low wages is awkward on the campaign trail. Also, I’m not sure working to get the company to hire more female MBAs is the kind of advance the new intersectional Hillary wants to emphasize.

Re: mechanics. Check out what’s going on at the Bernie Sanders for President Reddit. This is a social media campaign. Think of Zephyr Teachout’s primary challenge to Cuomo as proof of concept (30% against an incumbent spending 10% of what he did, almost no traditional media exposre), and ask yourself, how much more money and exposure do you need to get from 30% to 51%? Real time experiment playing out now at a theater near you.

I just had a funny thought: what if all the neocon Trump haters flee the Republican Party to support Hillary like they’ve been threatening to do–only to find that the Democrats have managed to shed their warmonger candidates too? They probably have some horrible operation planned out already to swing the public’s mood the right way again, as usual. So that should be on the list of things to watch for this year.

Lieberman had become a foil for Democrats in the eyes of Republican voters. Hillary could be cast out, but Hillary is a member of Team Blue. Republicans will never vote for her. Bernie is more likely to pickup GOP rank many file voters.

Faced with a hypothetical matchup between a dove-ish Trump and Sanders (who himself isn’t nearly as radical on foreign policy as he is domestically), the neo-cons could run a pretend “moderate” ticket. Kasich/Webb, for the sake of example. Then they neo-cons need only get enough electoral votes to get the election tossed into the House (Virginia and Ohio could possibly be enough). And then the establishment D & R sock-puppets in the house could elect President Kasich as “a good, realistic compromise”.

What are the progressive and Trump going to do? Stage a revolution? I’m sure they’ll be a dire threat to national security and accompanying war soon enough.

Would be nice if the conflation of “Arab” with “Muslim” could stay confined to Saudi chauvinists and neocon racists. For all the talk about black voters not being a monolith and “intersectionality” there’s almost no recognition that there are as many black Muslims in the US as there are Arabs, most of them with far deeper roots and more politically mobilised.

You are absolutely right on both counts (1) I struggled with the vocabulary; I take it that Arab would have been preferable in the second case? (2) Thinking only of our Mideast warmongering, I forget the black Muslims in the US, which IIRC is 30% of all our Muslims. Thanks for the corrections; I was quite rushed.

Yep, Arab would have been preferable, as RabidGandhi notes there are many Arab Christians, secular leftists, etc in the area who would have understood the ads perfectly well. You remember correctly, about 30% of American Muslims are black and about 30% are Arab, at least last time I checked. Despite that, the black American (or Blackamerican, as Dr. Sherman Jackson says) Muslim community, their contributions and concerns, are often ignored, both by Muslims themselves and by the broader society.

Also Dearborn is chock-full of Lebanese Christians who often get conflated as Muslim Arabs as well, but they are a very different demographic group. I love the ‘Muslims for Bernie’ storyline, but the numbers need a bit more scratching.

“It is a pity that Wall Street, with its ability to control all the wealth of the nation and to hire the best law brains in the country, has not produced some statesmen, some men who could see the dangers of bigness and of the concentration of the control of wealth. Instead of working to meet the situation, they are still employing the best law brains to serve greed and self-interest. People can only stand so much and one of these days there will be a settlement.” – Senator Harry S. Truman, Congressional Record, 1937

“The people don’t want a phony Democrat.” – President Harry Truman, Address at the National Convention Banquet of the Americans for Democratic Action, 1952

Totally ‘liberating’ these Truman quotes for FB electioneering. Corporate ‘crapification’ of both Republican and Democratic parties is complete, since the most authentic – like it or not – candidates in this election are not party members per usual (Trump and Sanders). Think we may already have our third party… the Up Yours party!

I think more important than the red-state blue-state divide is the fact that Bernie has demonstrated his appeal to independent voters.

Swing states where Bernie won in a landslide: NH and CO. Elector total: 13
Swing states where Hillary won in a landslide: VA. Elector total: 13
Swing states that were close: IA and NV. Elector total: 12

MI used to be a swing state; they went red from 1972-1988. The primary results suggest to me that they’re getting swingy again.

You have forgotten the rules: when it is close to fifty fifty but Clinton has the advantage it is a clear victory for Clinton, when Sanders has the advantage it must be a tie! Especially for the Bezos Gazette and the Grey Lady’s fish wrap.

Like the article that went around yesterday, Trump is Loki, but Trump has started Ragnarok for the American gods. Valhalla is in meltdown. He’s destroying gods left and right. McCain, the Bushes, Romney, and each chosen one of the GOP big backer class. He’s chained Christie and frightened the Kochs. Now, he’s turning on Hillary.

Sanders isn’t one of the gods and not worth discussion by the worshippers of the gods. After all, Bernie is a socialist Jew.

I think you’ll find one of the first Socialist Jews was some fellow who went by the name of Jesus – they built a religion around him, but forgot that he was both Jewish and a bit of an egalitarian – must go down like a lead balloon to the folk in the Bible belt.

So, again lets remind them: Jesus was both a Jew and a left-winger because he believed in a just and egalitarian society. As such, Bernie is carrying out God’s work and continuing where Jesus left off.

That depends on who’s defining Socialism. Americans have their own peculiar domestication definition. To an American, Socialism happens whenever the state does anything for anyone. “Communism” is the word Americans use that has the closest meaning to Socialism as understood by everyone else in the world.

I mainly only listen to local NPR programs, the NPR classical/jazz station (local), and some of the weekend non-news shows. I avoid NPR Faux Nooz Lite like the plague. A lot of their stenographers also work for Fox (really). It’s a pointless exercise in futility to waste my valuable time and brain cells listen to Faux Nooz National Propaganda Radio.

NPR here in san diego said it was a win for hill because she got more delegates when missippi and michigan are added together…no super delegate breakdown or analysis offered, i’m wondering why the hillary camp thinks that dems for sanders will show up for hill when the difference is made by unelected super delegates. there is a hardened split in my contacts between hillary and sanders supporters. With the poor showing by kasich it’s looking more and more like a prez trump. Although I wouldn’t vote for trump, i will write in sanders, the corporate dems being the clear and present danger. Comments re sanders not having congressional support are actually even more true with trump, he will face considerable obstruction, while clinton will take the reins from obama on the fly and drive the buggy full tilt down the road to neo libbercon utopia

I’m beginning to see TWO reasons to vote for Drumpf if he makes it through and Bernie doesn’t. The GOP reviles him with the heat of 100 suns and threatens to destroy the GOP (yes!), and trouncing the Clinton machine threatens to destroy the Dem party (more yes!).
Doing both with one candidate is quite appealing despite the risk.

Capitalism is essentially the same as every other social system since the dawn of civilisation.

The lower and middle classes do all the work and the upper, leisure Class, live in the lap of luxury. The lower class does the manual work; the middle class does the administrative and managerial work and the upper, leisure, class live a life of luxury and leisure.

The nature of the Leisure Class, to which the benefits of every system accrue, was studied over 100 years ago.

“The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study of Institutions”, by Thorstein Veblen.

(The Wikipedia entry gives a good insight. It was written a long time ago but much of it is as true today as it was then. This is the source of the term conspicuous consumption.)

We still have our leisure class in the UK, the Aristocracy, and they have been doing very little for centuries.

The UK’s aristocracy has seen social systems come and go, but they all provide a life of luxury and leisure and with someone else doing all the work.

Feudalism – exploit the masses through land ownership
Capitalism – exploit the masses through wealth (Capital)

Today this is done through the parasitic, rentier trickle up of Capitalism:

a) Those with excess capital invest it and collect interest, dividends and rent.
b) Those with insufficient capital borrow money and pay interest and rent.

All this was much easier to see in Capitalism’s earlier days.

Malthus and Ricardo never saw those at the bottom rising out of a bare subsistence living. This was the way it had always been and always would be, the benefits of the system only accrue to those at the top.

It was very obvious to Adam Smith:

“The Labour and time of the poor is in civilised countries sacrificed to the maintaining of the rich in ease and luxury. The Landlord is maintained in idleness and luxury by the labour of his tenants. The moneyed man is supported by his extractions from the industrious merchant and the needy who are obliged to support him in ease by a return for the use of his money. But every savage has the full fruits of his own labours; there are no landlords, no usurers and no tax gatherers.”

Like most classical economists he differentiated between “earned” and “unearned” wealth and noted how the wealthy maintained themselves in idleness and luxury via “unearned”, rentier income from their land and capital.

We can no longer see the difference between the productive side of the economy and the unproductive, parasitic, rentier side. This is probably why inequality is rising so fast, the mechanisms by which the system looks after those at the top are now hidden from us.

In the 19th Century things were still very obvious.

1) Those at the top were very wealthy
2) Those lower down lived in grinding poverty, paid just enough to keep them alive to work with as little time off as possible.
3) Slavery
4) Child Labour

Immense wealth at the top with nothing trickling down, just like today.

This is what Capitalism maximized for profit looks like.

Labour costs are reduced to the absolute minimum to maximise profit.

The beginnings of regulation to deal with the wealthy UK businessman seeking to maximise profit, the abolition of slavery and child labour.

The function of the system is still laid bare.

The lower class does the manual work; the middle class does the administrative and managerial work and the upper, leisure, class live a life of luxury and leisure.

The majority only got a larger slice of the pie through organised Labour movements.

By the 1920s, mass production techniques had improved to such an extent that relatively wealthy consumers were required to purchase all the output the system could produce and extensive advertising was required to manufacture demand for the chronic over-supply the Capitalist system could produce.

They knew that if wealth concentrated too much there would not be enough demand.

Of course the Capitalists could never find it in themselves to raise wages and it took the New Deal and Keynesian thinking to usher in the consumer society.

In the 1950s, when Capitalism had healthy competition, it was essential that the Capitalist system could demonstrate that it was better than the competition.

The US was able to demonstrate the superior lifestyle it offered to its average citizens.

Now the competition has gone, the US middle class is being wiped out.

The US is going third world, with just rich and poor and no middle class.

Raw Capitalism can only return Capitalism to its true state where there is little demand and those at the bottom live a life of bare subsistence.

Capitalism is a very old system designed to maintain an upper, Leisure, class. The mechanisms by which parasitic, rentier, “unearned”, income are obtained need to kept to an absolute minimum by whatever means necessary (legislation, taxation, etc ..)

Michael Hudson’s book “Killing the Host” illustrates these problems very well.

When you realise the true nature of Capitalism, you know why some kind of redistribution is necessary and strong progressive taxation is the only way a consumer society can ever be kept functioning. The Capitalists never seem to recognise that employees are the consumers that buy their products and services and are very reluctant to raise wages to keep the whole system going.

A good quote from John Kenneth Galbraith’s book “The Affluent Society”, which in turn comes from Marx.

“The Marxian capitalist has infinite shrewdness and cunning on everything except matters pertaining to his own ultimate survival. On these, he is not subject to education. He continues wilfully and reliably down the path to his own destruction”

Marx made some mistakes but he got quite a lot right.

Jeez, no one told me that global employees are the global consumers.
So as we all increase profits by cutting labour costs we are effectively cutting our own throats.
You got it.

One of the hidden plusses of the Sanders Small Donation System is that it facilitates constant communication ‘between’ the Sanders camp and voters. Regular, consistent posts from the HQ engender a feeling of ‘belonging’ and ‘purpose.’ Somewhat like a new religion.

Among my friends and family, it’s because literally only one person makes more than 30 grand a year. We can all spare 20 bucks every month or so, but no one ever has hundreds on hand and available at once.

I also followed the results from Michigan on twitter, but specifically emptywheel (Marcy Wheeler). She lives in MI and knows the important counties. I then went to the govt web pages of those counties, found the current election results as they came in, and drew my own conclusions. When Sanders started to pull ahead in Genesee County (Flint) I knew Sanders had a strong chance of winning,

The only reason the Clinton’s get half their donations is because they grovel so well and a large part of the umbrage at Sanders and Trump. Both operate out side the defined boundaries of – pay to pay – and that up sets the whole buzzard cart.

Now Sanders is the most worrisome as he operates completely outside this paradigm, tho won’t be engaged as it actually gives him airtime, which screws with the dominate narrative…. FFS he might start an actual debate.

Trump on the other hand is just an uncouth vulgarian that screws with the ambiance, jerking off in public, rather than retire to secure confines to pop his load after screwing the unwashed.

Skippy…. yet both screw with, on paper, the plan, to deal with the east….

I’ve begun to suspect ZH may be secretly controlling US politics. Agh… ZH would then have to run a conspiracy theory story about how a reclusive evil group of gold bugs set up a blog called ZH that is clandestinely running candidates to destabilise the western world (oh, and most unforgivably, is also fixing the price of gold)… that is so circular, my head would explode.

i refered to this particular thread. there’s a certain palpable mania in the air. so as to clear a certain confusion there seems to be, i believe that of all the available options, mr. sanders is by far the best choice. i do however lament that even if somehow he were to be elected, many people whose income and power will not be challenged will create enough chaos to squelch any chance of improvement for the common folk. it’s sad but, i believe, true. before each of us learns to govern ourselves better, hopes that somehow one person will lead us to a better world are dim.

Just to clarify… rolling back the atomatistic individualism perspective wrt our species – natural state – seems to be the major impediment. Its not like we don’t have decadal meta studies which clearly point this out, but, some wish to extend on already thread bare deductive reasoning…. thousands of years old.

Skippy…. absurdly enough at the end of the road one enters the/a “Kingdom”.

Number one among the Nuremberg principles and charter of the United Nations: no aggressive war. So yes perhaps the MSM should be painting that little mustache on Hillary rather than Trump. Trump seems eager to build walls to keep the rest of the world out. By contrast the 20th century fascists were all militarists and big believers that “war is the health of the state.” When the media go on and on about Trump as fascist it could be a case of what the psychologists call projection.

That said, there has always been an authoritarian bully boy quality to the modern Republican party and Trump seems quite willing to appeal to it. But it was always there–the unfortunate result of our transition from republic to empire. Perhaps our bloated and far too powerful military establishment is to blame. Politicians are always in danger of temptation by this “ring of power.”

When did it become silly to make not murdering people a central tenet of one’s life? Really, this is one of Earth’s oldest taboos, and yet it has become cool to flaunt your not-caring-about it like that is some badge of honor, and better qualifies you for office. How about if say kindness, and honesty, and “first, do no harm,” were exalted into the same high positions? Everything would be flipped on its head, and in my opinion, we’d be a lot better for it. It’s not silly.

I wonder how this is going to sit over at the Daily Kos, I mean the primary still won’t be a done deal on March 15th now. That no negative Clinton diaries thing is looking even more like Clinton pandering and even stupider than it did.

It’s funny, right now the front page article is a cartoon about Trump.

And the third article is about Republicans attacking Duckworth (which has another layer of nuance since her candidacy was part of the Dem establishment to prevent actual grassroots activity back when Cegelis had paved the way to defeat Hastert and then the party swooped in to recruit Duckworth so that Cegelis wouldn’t win the seat).

So, basically, it’s the Clinton strategy. When all else fails, talk about the Republicans.

Meteor Blades is still offering a more reasoned (ie, reality-based approach), though. Plenty of Sanders supporters in the comments.

I was in the bag for Bernie from day one, but I like to look ahead and see what I’m getting myself into. My own expectations of B. Obama were quite low in 2008 but he managed to underperform them (while the Republicans came through in grand style).

So what does a thoughtful person see ahead with a President Bernie? Can we cast a clear eye? How does this play out?

I’m thinking of looking to possible comparisons to previous (J. Carter, ’76) and current (J. Corbyn across the pond, in progress) cases of, well, political outsider from the left end up at the head of the table (and maybe some similar qualities of temperament), and what happened then.

If memory serves (and please set me straight if it doesn’t) Carter, always something of a loner, had a hard time getting traction with Congress, as well as considerably confusion and derision from the (nascent, burgeoning) neo-con right that came after, and from within his own party, and the press. I believe I see a similar overall pattern (again, correct me) for Corbyn, only more so: press is skeptical to derisive, and Labor is still procession what it all really means for them (how much of this is sheer denial of inevitable transformation and how much is stubborn inertial durability is not clear to me). Lessons here might serve not only to anticipate some obvious pitfalls, but perhaps to sidestep (or even strategically use) some of them.

A Bernie presidency would represent a huge challenge for the Dem establishment, not completely different from what the Republican party is going through but with different specifics (and also a later start). Without a continuing and active grassroots network (writing, marching, contributing, putting up candidates, etc), I think Bernie would be dead in the water come 2017. And accepting a largely negative reaction from business, how much will be a unified front, and what kind of internecine squabbling could take place?

Can a post-presidential grassroots activist network flip Congress in two years (it took the Tea Party 4-6)? I don’t think Sanders has a second term without significant success in his first? The stakes are even higher; 2020 is a census year, as in: redistricting time.

Also, the disenfranchised usually get hit the hardest when systems shift gears (for example, loss of some good policies in the ACA rollout, not to mention the website). Given a hostile business front that will try to punish the vulnerable, what is the blowback on a $15 minimum wage.

If Bernie is elected, he should go with the big infrastructure/jobs package and single payer the first day. It’s hard to believe the Dems would oppose the first, not sure if he could pick off enough R’s to pass it, but probably not for the second. Either way, he would have 2 signatures issues on which he could get a clear sense of who was willing to come with him and who wasn’t. Then, he should spend the rest of his first 2 years convincing us that we need to elect a new and better Congress in 2018. And not starting new wars.

It’s a long process and the forces of reaction will drive hard at the meme that nothing major can get done so why try? The parallel isn’t exact but a Bernie win in 2016 would be akin to Roosevelt in 32. To achieve meaningful change, he would then need a 2018 like 1934 and a 2020 like 1936.

Carter was shafted by the press, and it continues to this day as he is often mentioned as “worst modern president”, etc. I think Bernie is going to be a lot more outspoken that Carter was. He also has his experience in the senate which Carter lacked. At this point in time (things are much more dire now than in the late 70s) I don’t think the people who elect Bernie will stand for the obstruction.

I was toggling between CNN and msnbc throughout, so I’m not sure on which it was mentioned, but one or the other attributed the upset to large numbers of independents who showed up at the open primary to vote for Bernie. Would pollsters have caught that? Or would they have been looking only at likely Democratic voters?

Reading through some of the specific polls that fivethirtyeight uses, it’s interesting that some of them don’t try to catch it. They outsource the demographic projection to some other group, for example, or they do things like saying landlines are close enough to a good approximation that they don’t need to include cell phones. And something else about the polls, nearly all of them were conducted before the Democratic debate in Michigan, which seems kind of odd then to base any predictions off of them unless one assumes debates held in the very location of the election are irrelevant (which itself is interesting).

For example, to pick on the YouGov poll that underestimated younger voter support for Sanders. It was conducted a week ago, and the poll found that 1/3 of Dem primary voters had not firmly decided on their candidate at that time. YouGov also included a sample that was 30% for those under 45, whereas exit polling from CNN suggests actual turnout for those under 45 was more like 45%. And it gave a 32 point advantage to Sanders in the under 30 crowd, whereas CNN’s exit poll suggested an actual spread of more like 62 points.

When things go as expected, the various assumptions and simplifications hold. But that very bias makes it virtually impossible to predict discontinuous change, since by definition, that is assumed away by the modeling.

But isn’t the takeaway there that she lost the independents in large numbers? How does she win a general election without young voters and independents? My guess is she would pivot in her usual clumsy manner away from the more left-leaning positions she’s been pushed to take, and go back to her comfort zone as a center-right Rockefeller-style Republican with a (D) after her name.

I am less concerned that she is screwed than that the Dem establishment would rather screw us all over in order to protect their comfortable positions in the power structure.

Yeah, I think Clinton’s general election pitch is pretty straightforward. She’s the pragmatic Republican protecting us from Trumpomania. No Good Democrat would prefer Hitler over a Republican, after all!

Independents have been breaking hard for Sanders (not just in Michigan). In CNN’s exit polling, for example, in SC – a state Clinton won by a huge margin – Sanders still actually won voters under 30 (by 8 points) and Independents (by 7 points). Go to a state that was competitive, like Massachusetts, and it’s a 30 point spread for voters under 30 and a 33 point spread on Independents. CNN didn’t even do exit polling in places like Minnesota and Kansas. In Oklahoma, Sanders won under 30 voters by 65 points and Independents by 48.

Not sure about everywhere off the top of my head, but California Democrats are allowing non-affiliated voters to vote in their primary (just make sure if you are here and registering, you don’t get confused and register for the American Independent Party; then you would be stuck voting in THAT primary, whatever it may be). We are the very last day of the primary. FWIW.

My own take away is that in order for the investment in electronic election fraud to pay off, polls must be discredited.

It used to be that exit polling was the best, most reliable defense against election fraud, and was used all over the globe to access the legitimacy of election results.

So far the history of electronic manipulation has overlapped the history of effective polling, which means the manipulators have only felt safe changing votes when the margin is very close.

The decline in polling accuracy will lead to more audacious efforts, probably successful, to steal elections as the people are trained not to believe poll results.

Most pollsters now days are actually trying to influence as opposed to measure the mood of the electorate, this hasn’t helped matters, and probably accounts for most of the negative sentiment held by the people as concerns pollsters.

Looks like this could be the last election cycle where anyone pays attention to the polls, and that isn’t good for us, it would be sad to think that the Republican technical team might be all that stands between our future and President Trump.

Interesting point, Watt4Bob. The golden age of polling happened when most households had a landline. Before then, access was a problem. Now there are too many alternative communication channels, and each has its demographic bias (more old people on landlines, etc.).

However, all this can be offset in politics by focusing on exit polls. In this age of personal broadcasting, people may be more willing to be open about their opinions in public.

“In a major upset over Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders won the Michigan Democratic primary election. Polling in early March and late February showed Clinton with a lead over Sanders ranging from 11 to more than 30 points. But, as Ballotpedia senior writer Jim Barnes wrote in an analysis leading up to March 8, “Michigan has a history of delivering presidential primary upsets.” Sanders won 50 to 48 percent.

Exit poll data, a representative sampling of voters as they left their precinct polling stations, shows that several major voting groups were sharply divided between Clinton and Sanders. Clinton won women 51 to 46 percent, while Sanders won college graduates 51 to 48 percent and voters without college degrees 49 to 48 percent. Voters with incomes under $50,000 supported Sanders over Clinton 51 to 46 percent. Voters with incomes above $50,000 backed him 50 to 49 percent. With other groups, the divide was more significant. Clinton won older voters 61 to 36 percent and African-Americans 65 to 31 percent. Sanders, on the other hand, outperformed Clinton with white voters 57 to 41 percent and younger voters 67 to 32 percent. Voters between the ages of 18 and 24 backed him over Clinton 87 to 13 percent. Fifty-eight percent of Democratic primary voters in Michigan said international trade “takes away U.S. jobs.” Sanders, who has taken stances against international trade agreements such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership, won a majority of those voters.[1] 130 pledged delegates were at stake. ”

Interesting about the black vote. Perhaps AA voters in the South are simply more conservative than their counterparts in some of these Northern states. Which is to say the local political climate may matter more than race or at least play a bigger role than the stereotypes of the identity politics crowd would concede. Some of the NC comments following HIll’s win in SC were verging on the old seg era “block voting” accusations and there were even mentions of “walking around money” (a Northern tradition, I believe).

The Newshour last night had a segment talking about Fallows’ small city airplane trip and the focus was on nearby Greenville, SC. The black politician interviewed said race was much less a factor for her constituents than the economy. The implication was that local African Americans are fully onboard with our state’s Republican business booster focus. If blacks are to be the “vanguard of the revolution,” as described in a recent documentary, then that may have to happen up North.

Interesting about the black vote. Perhaps AA voters in the South are simply more conservative than their counterparts in some of these Northern states.

I’m delighted by the Michigan result, and I’m quite mystified about all the votes that Clinton is getting in the South. More conservative than Northerners? Were they hoping to be able to vote for Ben Carson?

The black politician interviewed said race was much less a factor for her constituents than the economy.

Possibly true, but wouldn’t this be an incentive to vote for Sanders? He’s the one who is emphasizing the abuses by the billionaire class.

Guess what I’m saying is that Southern blacks may be less likely recruits for Sanders’ socialist proletariat because race relations in the South–or at least the part of it that I live in– are better these days. That’s not at all to say there is economic equality but that political side of the black community see themselves as pulling on the same oar as the whites and in SC the whites are mostly Republicans. Therefore they may be more open to Hillary, a closet Republican. This is just speculation of course–may not be true of other states or in fact of this one.

It could be that North African Americans have a better sense of humor than South African Americans.

Maybe NAAs realize that the phrase “American politics is the art of getting chickens to vote for Colonel Sanders.” is really a humorous take on the machinations of politics and not a dire warning from the Democratic [and Republican] party.

The SAAs take this phrase too seriously [could be a spooky religious thing?] and think this means they should vote for the Clinton-Obama Dynasty.

The Dynasty is, at best, only 1/3 Black. So economic policy must be the important thing to SAAs. Like, if we start with Bill – welfare reform, NAFTA, banking deregulation, China in the WTO… Then after a brief hiatus under the Neocons, Obama and Hillary grabbed the Neocon torch and ensured strong entry level job prospects for Blacks within the Army, and also domestically achieved all those things Chris Rock spoke of at the Academy Awards. They saved the banks and Wall Street in their spare time which is good for everyone and Eric Holder [he’s a black dude too!] did his part to minimize overcrowding at our community jails. TPP and the Grand Bargain are still future goals being pursued for black folk, and may even impact white folks as well!

And also taking seriously I believe as Starveling says below Northern blacks had a lot more to lose from things like nafta than Southern blacks. Down here nafta was the final blow to the textile industry–local GOP tycoon Milliken opposed it if I recall–but those pre-integration industries probably didn’t have many blacks working in them anyway.

It’s probably lunch pail issues. Northern blacks have a deeper community memory of the better times that existed before the plants all started to shut down. Southern blacks either never left the farm or benefitted in small ways from the expansion of the sunbelt.

Rust belt whites and blacks both have a common economic grievance that can play out in instances like this.

Lunch pail is part of it, but, put more brutally, blacks who depend on patronage jobs support the establishment candidates. The Rust Belt has a lot of blacks who didn’t need to, or chose not to, rely on jobs that depend(ed) on meeting racial quotas–factory jobs, teaching jobs and others. Now those jobs are gone or under threat. The Clintons are all about patronage and tokenism, not jobs in law, medicine, academia, factories, transportation, the arts–anything outside of the bureaucracy.

I think it was me who mentioned ‘walking around money’ in reference to New Orleans politics. New Orleans is structured much more closely like the North than most any old town Down South. In other parts of the south, ‘walking around money’ takes the more traditional form of contracts for public works and grants to be administered by local power groups, such as ‘faith based groups’ and racial preferences, (which can be of any group you want.)
One of the ‘Vanguards of the Revolution’ not generally spoken about, because they are really feared, down here, are the Black Separatist movements. Those folk, (a proper use of the word in this context,) are focused, flexible, and armed to the teeth.

Speaking of NOLA politics, I caught the author of “5 DOLLARS AND A PORK CHOP SANDWICH”, Mary Frances Berry, on Tavis Smiley being interviewed about the political scene now and her book. It’s about the corruption of democracy from the decoupling of the public from power of voting by solely focusing on the get out the vote effort, simply the stock piling of votes to get elected and voter participation ending there. Instead of using the activity of coming out to vote as a way for people to come together to get more power over elected officials, for example, by holding voter organized meeting for petitions to get on primary ballots and connecting the these petition activities to have prospects come before the voters to receive a list of policy demands to adhere to, we are simply given rides, a reminder phone call, etc to vote and then the relationship abruptly halts. Once the elected official gets the vote, they tend to be done with the citizenry, for the most part, unless you are a mater of squeaky wheel tactics.

The mechanisms of party control are relevant. Sanders isn’t going to do well in a Southern style, charismatic church outside of a Catholic one. Organizing is done through churches. Ministers are trusted. As you leave the South, charismatic churches are less relevant.

Two, many potential supporters are felons and don’t have voting rights in Southern states. Sanders was pitching to people who can’t vote.

Thirdly, the racial based gerrymandering has created safe districts where growing the electorate isn’t a priority of many elected African Americans. They are safe from the GOP, and winning statewide is likely out of reach. Why would they want new voters? New voters means new people at lower levels and ultimately challengers. Part of the 1994 Republican victory was due to safe Democrats giving up on their districts and not having a bench or party operation to save the seat in an anti-incumbent election. Those same Democrats tolerated this to protect themselves from challengers in their own party.

I’m sure Hillary was promising an additional expansion of the office of faith based initiatives to the ministers.

that newshour piece on greenville started a big to do at our house because of my disbelief that PBS would showcase right to work SC as the way forward for american towns, esp. the lady who highlighted public private partnerships as being the way to go. Full Republican masquerading as we care Democrat… the hillarites are being unmasked and they’re not happy about it at all…PBS, heckuva job kenneth tomlinson

The PBS piece was on Fallows’ Atlantic series not just Greenville. I haven’t read all the stuff in the Atlantic but looks like Greenville was the only southern town included. I couldn’t tell you whether the subject of unions even comes up in those articles.

As for the black lady Judy Woodruff interviews and her enthusiasm for “public-private partnerships” this just speaks to my point. Neoliberalism is the local ideology down here and many blacks seem to be supporters as the local economy in upstate SC is on the upswing. It isn’t just about unions or manufacturing as many of the new jobs are service jobs where unions were never particularly strong to begin with. I’m no fan of Woodruff but this seemed a fairly straightforward piece of reporting. If you are outraged perhaps that should be directed at Fallows.

we never made it to the end of that piece, the part i saw was greenville, and the public private lady was white and being interviewed with the mayor. I pointed out that lots of boeing jobs have gone to SC in order to crush the unions in seattle and i didn’t see why the supposedly “left wing” newshour would have this story without bringing that up. Ire was already present from an earlier piece re syrian refugees when i was asked what i would do about the refugees (of course i must have muttered something along the lines of i bet there are a lot of banksters who don’t mind seeing cheap labor flooding into unionized europe, …no matter how hard i try i can’t keep my mouth shut…) I said we should stop making refugees and was regarded as a most unrealistic and crazy person.

A few rounds inter-league speed debating is what we need just about now. A half hour each round:

Trump vs. Sanders
Cruz vs. Clinton
Sanders vs. Cruz
Clinton vs, Trump

The really interesting one would be Sanders vs. Cruz since this is where there is most ideological difference. You would get two different Trumps, subdued and serious against Sanders and a trashing-talking tyrant against Clinton!

On young voters, the intergenerational changes coming has long been an interest for me. It seems that our establishment politicians and media didn’t believe their own polling years ago that young people openly identify as socialists. Guess what, they’re now voting for somebody who calls himself a socialist. Shocking!

The single most interesting thing from CNN’s Michigan exit poll to me is that Clinton won people over 45 while Sanders won people under 45. There are two different Democratic parties, but the DC-NY-urban elite crowd has been so stuck in their bubble they honestly seem to be surprised about it, as if the growing inequality between younger and older households wouldn’t manifest itself in political dissatisfaction at some point.

After having read the above comments (and the ones in the Guardian), I am really pumped up thinking about a Bernie win. I sure hope that happens. (President Sanders will really like working with our PM in Canada!) Hurrah for the voters.

We have socialism for the rich and austerity for the rest of us and I think people know this and see through the “he’s a socialist” meme that was meant to detract from his policy stances. I’m learning a lot from this election cycle, including how afraid southern blacks are of repug-licans that want to turn back the clock to the days of Jim Crow – so afraid they vote for HRC overwhelmingly. It’s astounding and It should not be that way, ever. Bernie knows it, we know it and the whole world should know it and will if he gets the nomination. Really glad Bernie is getting the recognition in the north that he deserves. Go Bernie !!! Another donation on the way !

BTW, people aren’t voting for the Senator that never shows up for work and when interviewed can’t talk for 2 minutes without a drink of water to quench his cotton mouth? Shocking hahahahaa

“… and CNN announcers relentlessly clicking on their fancy interactive map to find that one precinct pop-up where the missing Clinton votes could possibly be.”
Lambert, you have a way with words that has me still grinnin’ 30 minutes later!
While I didn’t watch the results as they were coming in last night because the reporting has been so biased, it seems you summed it up quite well. Thank you.

My source with access to the local Democrat hierarchy says that the primary is a tie and that it’s going to be a brokered convention. It will be brokered by Obama and Biden will be the nominee.

When I think about it, Biden’s probably the most difficult Dem for Trump to bully. He looks like a schmuck beating up on the Vice President of the United States, a jovial fellow with a dead veteran son who just wants to do a cancer “Moon-Shot” that we can all get behind. Biden has already done a fine job distancing himself from HRC and his shambling style likely never made many Death-Star soundbites stumping for Obama’s policies. The Dem hierarchy will like Biden, because he’s Wall Street-friendly — but not in an obvious way that Trump can hang on him.

I think your contact is smoking something very strong. The only way that happens is if the Clintons support it. Obama is a lame duck with no future political aspirations. The Clintons, not Obama, controls the party apparatus right now. And Biden will be running a race with empty coffers. Tell me how he does that from a cold start over the summer.

Let’s say your source is relaying insider information accurately. That information is still conjecture about a future state. What it says about the current state is that they are already starting to count Clinton out. And that there is no support expected from the current administration for her campaign.

Interesting. Biden is definitely quite establishmenty. I remember vividly the Obama campaign’s energetic embrace of Biden’s worst policies on the drug war and war on terror and so forth when they introduced him as the running mate.

But I think that’s more aspirational than predictive. If we have a brokered convention, it means the anti-fearmongering, anti-warmongering, anti-bailout, anti-Clinton dissatisfaction with the fascist Dems has so strongly split the party that even the full weight of the superdelegate advantage is insufficient to push Clinton over the top.

If that happens, all bets are off. That’s a real, actual political revolution.

P.S., the other issue with a brokered convention is it requires either 1) O’Malley getting some traction, and/or 2) Biden entering the race before the convention. Otherwise one of Sanders or Clinton will, by definition, have more than half the delegate votes.

Romney can more plausibly threaten a GOP brokered convention because there are more than two candidates who have won delegates.

My friend (who may or may not enjoy strong drink/smoke) thinks that HRC only breaks the “tie” with Sanders by playing the Superdelegate card.

My friend thinks that this will look too much like “stealing” the nomination, and that the Dem hierarchy will fear that they will so alienate Bernie’s supporters that they won’t show up at the polls, or even worse cast protest votes for Trump (like some of Lambert’s pals have already threatened). The leadership is trapped in choosing between 1968 and 1972 — nightmares that divided the party and threw both elections to Nixon, to the eventual disgrace of the nation.

Instead, Obama rides into the City of Brotherly Love and convinces both Bernie and the Clintons to throw their weight behind Biden, “for the good of the Party.” For a neo-liberal with ties to Wall Street, big pharma, the military-industrial complex, and even Ukrainian thugs, Biden was sure making nice toward Sanders when he tested the waters last Fall.

As for money, the Wall Street Wing beneficiaries of the Holder Doctrine and the FIRE beneficiaries of Obamacare will take care of Biden, just as they have been the financial power behind the chain-smoking “community organizer” from Chicago who appeared to have run his 2008 campaign without two quarters to rub together until his “individual” donations from Golden Sacks employees were tallied.

The Clintons are convinced of their divine right to rule. And they play hardball and have no shame. Unless Bernie has a clear majority of delegates going into the convention, they will treat this as a non-issue, particularly since the MSM has been backing them all the way. As much as I am encouraged by Michigan, Sanders still very much has an uphill battle. And Sanders agreed to support the winner, not create the winner. How can he talk of a revolution and then choose to throw his delegates to Biden? That’s not at all the same as being beaten fair and square.

Now Hillary could throw the towel in, but I see that happening only if an indictment has happened or is imminent. or she has serious health problems.

Who controls whether HRC gets indicted? Obama. He just makes a call to Loretta and shows HRC her subpoena. She publicly claims a “health problem” and throws her support to Biden because Sanders is “unelectable” and “we can’t have another 1972.”

Another Bernie hit piece masquerading as a balanced critique. Hillary’s positions are better because they are more nuanced? You have to be kidding me. Vox is a neoliberal rag desperate for access, and this piece just exemplifies the low levels to which the owners and writers will stoop.

Oh, screw that nuanced shit. That is the same triangulation game Clinton has played all along, and it is part of the reason we have such a mess in this country regarding this issue. It is basing laws on religious beliefs that should all be left to the individual. The asses don’t want an abortion, they don’t have to have one. End of their say in the matter. But god forbid Clinton actually FIGHT for women to make the decisions on their own without interference from some pastor/senator/man they never met.

Oh, I paid no attention to what the writer told me to think, I just read what the candidates said. Bernie says it’s not the gov’t business, that came through loud and clear. Hillary has a plan that she will fight for, or tweak, or something. Bernie stance looked *way* better to me.

I find it interesting that the HuffPo banner headline is about “Rubio running out of options” while the massive Bernie upset in Michigan is the first story in the center mail column. Not surprising; just wonder if they really think we’re too dumb to notice.

I really liked Charles Blow’s insightful comment about two Black Americas and the great migration. I am white but I like to think that I know a little about Black America. I’ve travelled and lived all over the US now, but I grew up in the eighties in a small, racially divided southern town. I attended a public school that was 60% black and every black teacher of mine in elementary school was formerly employed by the “separate but equal” black school system prior to desegregation. I didn’t realize how close I was to the bad ole’ segregated south growing up, but it boggles my mind and certain things make more sense to me now looking back. I was raised by my working mother and two different black nannies. They were surrogate moms to me. I would play with their nieces, nephews and grand-children at their house sometimes and other times at my parents. I even attended church with them on a couple of different occasions. I left the south after graduating college but I didn’t forget the lessons of my youth. I said from the very beginning of Sanders campaign, that an old, lefty, New York Jew is going to have a really tough time connecting with older, black voters in the south. I don’t think most Americans realize just how conservative southern blacks really are, particularly the ones old enough to remember the bad old days of segregation and before. The cultural DNA of the diaspora blacks of the north and the blacks that stayed behind is very different. Besides the attitudes and personality types that may have been more likely to migrate north or west, it’s important to remember that the social climate in the south would reward and penalize behaviors by both whites and blacks in a manner very different from cultures found in the north and the west. There are still plenty of strong pockets of racism today outside of the south, particularly in the northeast, appalachia, and the midwest but nowhere I’ve visited can compare to racism found in the deep southern states of the Gulf and Mississippi delta region. Radical personalities and those who are quick to embrace new ideas don’t fare very well in those parts of the country. Slow, steady, quite and modest is your best bet for survival. Almost like Clinton’s “slow incremental change” campaign theme. Clinton keeps running up the delegate score with the support of southern black grannies like the ones who raised me, but she is running out of deep south. Meanwhile Sanders is forging new coalitions and crushing the under-forty vote, so even if he can’t win the DNC’s rigged primary this year the future looks bright for leaders that want to pick up Sanders mantle in the near future.

Besides the attitudes and personality types that may have been more likely to migrate north or west, it’s important to remember that the social climate in the south would reward and penalize behaviors by both whites and blacks in a manner very different from cultures found in the north and the west.

Very true & excellent point. I grew up in small town Alabama & permanently moved away in January 1990. It is a very pro-establishment place, where, at least back then, people who were willing to be noticably different had to be very exceptional in some way or willing & able to fend for themselves, otherwise they would be ostracized or bullied. Birmingham & Tuscaloosa were better, at least in pockets, but outside of the university system you were still expected to behave in a very conservative manner. Going home to visit over the years & seeing giant billboards–in cities!–saying things like “Go to church or go to Hell” (that is an exact quote; I shall never forget it; horribly wrongheaded and asinine even from a fundamentalist Christian perspective) or “praise be the glory of the fetus, may those who harm it suffer eternal torment” (not an exact quote but pretty much an exact sentiment on a large # of signs) did not make me change my thoughts a whole hella lot, or–and this is kinda funny in light of my current politics–talking with a group of business owners in an airport who suddenly turned their backs on me & excluded me from conversation when they were trashing Hillary and I said “I like Hillary” & after a shocked silence one of them said “You need to listen to Rush Limbaugh son, learn some things” followed by “I’ve heard Rush. Not really a fan.” That ended that conversation abruptly. Among other things.

And I have (or rather had, kinda lost touch) friends from Alabama involved in state & national democratic politics, and whatever their private inclinations they were just as conservative as the Republicans (among whom I had an equal # of friends) on most things in public, and kept very quiet about issues where they were not with the growing conservative majority there (it should be noted that this is a HORRIBLE long term strategy, if you have actual principles in opposition to the spreading & solidifying right-wing belief system). I had nonetheless expected better from the South, and am still disappointed/horrified at the voting there, but this reminder does explain a lot. With a lot of help from the DNC & MSM, they were convinced Bernie would not win, and might even lose by an amount they would find embarrassing, & knowingly fighting a lost cause is (or was) generally derided back there, and no one wants to be an object of derision. Also, a lot of Southerners just don’t like people from the Northeast. End stop. I for some reason thought that would have changed by now, and/or that Bernie was sufficiently atypical for this to be a non-factor anyway. But maybe not. Plus it may be people still consider Hillary a Southerner from her time in Arkansas, and she’s getting the “one of us” vote.

Wow. Who would have thought Muslim Americans would actually vote for the Jewish guy instead of the person who voted to invade Iraq, brags about having Henry Kissenger as a mentor, supported Obama’s continuation of the Bush/Cheney drone assassination policy, and spearheaded the ousting of Gaddafi and the destabilization of Syria as Secretary of State? What could these crazy Muslim voters be thinking?!?

My going theory now is that Hillary was the GOP pick from the beginning.

Even if Trump bullies his way to the nomination, he’ll just pull a mic drop at the convention- “Fuck this shit, I have other things to do.”

The GOP convention then turns into an orgy of bloodlust. Candidates, and their followers bashing each other over the head with folding chairs. Trump, getting away by the seat of his pants on his helicopter, Rubio and kasich trying to grab a hold of it and get out alive, are pushed back onto the roof, to be taken beofore the new dark lord Cruz.

Meanwhile, Cruz has already turned the podium into a sacrifice altar. He needs 20 virgins to bring about the apocalypse, “But who can muster that, these days? Values– gone.” he thinks to himself as he slashes another neck, blood dripping down his white gown.

Maybe a golden calf? “Bring me the helicopter of satan!”

Luckily, one of the trump supporters, who came prepared with a SAM, sees the writing on the wall and changes sides, taking aim from the parking lot and smiting his new enemy with the grace of Raytheon. The betrayal is now complete. Trump’s burned corpse is recovered, and pieces of it are handed out as communion, by the new High Priest of Cleveland, and all Ohio lands.

I actually read through it. Looks like “BernieBro” is a lost cause; it’s used universally. To me, that’s a very obvious foreshadowing of Clinton’s tack to the center in the general, where she’ll try to pick up moderate Republican votes. (I mean, come on. “Bro” after Sanders does very well with all women, and especially younger women?

In other words, Clinton does not want, and does not think she needs, Sanders votes (or his apparatus, or his platform, unsurprisingly, since socialism is anathema and single payer is “never, never, never.”

After 2010 and 2014, one has to ask how many slices of the population the Democratic Establishment can throw under the bus before collapsing. I guess the answer is “We’ll find out!”

fukk I wonder if he won ’cause I gave him that $100 a few weeks ago. I had no idea it would pay off like this! Wow.

I made up a poem today:
Bernie! Bernie!
QED!
Bernie! Bernie!
QED!

It actually rhymes! You keep saying it over and over again until you get tired of it. For me, that was 52 times. I’ll start again tomorrow and probably last at least 38 times. The next day it might be 20 times. But it’ll never be zero! It’s always gonna be at least 0.0001 times. Or even 0.00000000003141527 times. As long as the universe lasts it’s going to be above zero.

This puts Professor Kelton so much closer to the budget it’s almost unbelievable. We should start the MMT lessons now, so people can get used to it, because if we hit them with it all at once, they’ll freak out. It’s hard to understand at first, that is for sure. But after a while, you get it. Doesn’t it just crack you up to think of all those economists who can’t even understand the basic idea of money? It’s just incredible. Yo, all you homies in the PG, you go tell your homies on the block to vote for Bernie even if he look like your landlord, He ain’t your landlord! he ain’t even rich! All you sensitive, caring white people, you guys send money to Bernie, just stop your PG typing for 4 minutes and send him some money — NOW. None of the homies out there ever gonna pay you any mind anyway. You’re nowhere near cool enough for that. So you do what you can.

Yeah! I hope Bernie & Steph have the foresight to go into volume production on MMT WiFi Connected Secret Decoder Rings so everyone can stay tuned in to the new Budget Creation Process. It would sure help during debates and the black folks could figure it out too! For now, we’d probably have to stick with plastic decoder rings shipped in a box of cereal, but then once we get the hang of things we can upgrade to gold decoder rings once Bernie & Steph take over the Whitey House. Black people like gold rings and chains too! They could make Mr T “Cabinet Dude In Charge Of MMT Gold Decoder Rings”. If that doesn’t get Bernie elected, I don’t know what will.

he used to scare the hell out of me, Mr T did. Even on the TV I’d see him all mean and I’d imagine myself getting my skinny little whteboy ass kicked by him and all his gold chains. It would make me nervous when he came on. I think he started on Starsky & Hutch. When I first came to New Yawk, a long time ago, I walked into a diner in my neighborhood late one night — I was 22 years old and a real hayseed. I saw the actor who played Huggy Bear on Starsk & Hutch eating by himself at a table and I went up to him and said “Wow! You’re Huggy Bear!” I was like “Whoa this is amazing”. Just me and him in an empty diner with the streets outside dark in the night so the empty tables and chairs reflected in the windows and only the streetlights came through from the night. I think I scared the shlt out of him. He just looked down at the table with a frightened look on his face. I thought to myself “Wow, I’m in New York now. I”m having a real New York experience here. I guess TV isn’t real after all.”

Bernie! Bernie!
QED
Bernie! Bernie!
QED

I may give him another $100. I wonder if Mr. T could go campaign for him down south where all the black folk lives. He could say “All you homies vote for Bernie or I’m gonna kick your ass” They might laugh at him since he’s over 60 now and probably couldn’t kick a 25 year old’s ass, although maybe Mr. T is gonna vote for Trump. He can vote for whoever he wants to.

The concept of the unbiased political reporter is difficult to accept today. The financial and commercial systems require us all to be economic animals responding to self-advantage. It is only that handful of people with more loot than they can spend who can step off the treadmill and act honestly.

Can any of the political reporters be financially qualified in that way? Seems highly unlikely.

The only thing that might produce an honest pollster is the fear of the owners of the polling company that their venality will be exposed and they will have to start another biz.

Congrats to Lambert for focusing his attention where it matters and not on the prima donnas.

Hope you chaps are going to cover this because the MSM are still concentrating on the ‘Clinton meme’, when the fact remains, judging by comments I’ve read on about 12 different blogs and news outlets, that Sanders whipped Clinton’s arse, and got a huge standing ovation from the Florida audience.

As ever, The Guardian coverage of the debate is as dishonest and biased as ever, but the comments on CIF under this propaganda piece are really positive for Sanders. Given the odds against Jeremy Corbyn winning the UK’s leadership of the Labour Party last year – 200/1 in places – and depth of propaganda issued against him, Corbyn won by being honest and wiped the floor with the Labour Party neoliberals.

Here’s hoping Sanders sweeps the floor with Hellory on 15th March, he’s got the momentum and if you check out his stump speeches and debate issues thus far stands head and shoulders above the Wall Street witch with blood on her hands.

While pleased with the Sanders win, I think Michigan was a good deal more ‘ripe’ for his message than many other States because the damage from the GFC was so great – Detroit bankrupt, hollowed-out, barely functioning as a modern city, the Flint debacle, etc. I would also point out Michigan’s proximity and exposure to Canada and Canadian media, so voters know for a fact single-payer works, that social safety nets work, that Government can do positive things, etc.

That said, I still see no chance for Sanders to become the Democratic candidate unless Clinton withdraws due to trouble with the FBI. Were I Obama I would cut her loose, given the Clintons (and Bush holdovers) essentially ran his first, disastrous, term from which he never recovered.